Sergei Lukyanenko
Born in Kazakhstan and educated as a psychiatrist, Sergei Lukyanenko is a prolific award-winning
writer, author of over 25 books. He lives in Moscow with his family In Russia, the three volumes of
the Night Watch Trilogy have sold over two million hard covers between them. The Night
Watch has been adapted into film and has been distributed round the world. Internationally
acclaimed, the film was Russia's contender for the 2004 foreign language Oscar award.

I tend to be wary of overhyped and overly popular books, so I must admit that when first delving into Sergei
Lukyanenko's The Day Watch, with no knowledge of its predecessor The Night Watch, I was ready -- almost
expecting -- to be disappointed -- but, thankfully, such was not the case.

Some "marketers" have compared the Night Watch Trilogy to recent fantasy bestsellers such as
J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials series, but,
unlike these, the Night Watch Trilogy involves realistic contemporary (post-communism modern,
slightly decaying Russian) urban landscapes, strictly adult characters, with adult interests, motivations and
issues, organized in highly hierachical multi-member fraternal organisations, battling on many fronts, and trying
to intrigue their way to superiority over the other side. In this sense the Night and Day watches, which operate
outside the ken of the 'mundanes' are much more reminiscent of the title characters in Katherine Kurtz's early
Deryni series books.

In the world which Lukyanenko portrays, there exists a second, magic-powered parallel world, termed the Twilight,
which remains unseen and unsensed by the "mundanes." The Others, Dark and Light use this arena to fight the
age-old battle of 'good' vs. 'evil' -- though just what one chooses to see as 'good' and 'evil' are a
question of perspective. Just as in Michael Moorcock's The War Amongst the Angels
the 'good' can be seen as stiflers of freedom and progress, and the 'bad' as the reckless foe of the safe
status quo, from The Day Watch one can generate a list of more or less fuzzy dichotomies to
describe the two sides:

The Day Watch

The Night Watch

Alignment

'bad'

'good'

Name of Individuals

Dark Others

Light Others

What one might expect their motto to be

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole
of the Law... (Aleister Crowley)

Whatsoever ye would that men should doe to you, doe ye
even so to them. (KJV Bible, 1611)

Attitude

Self-centered

Concerned with others

Political viewpoint

Libertarians or
Capitalism

Social democrats or
Communism

Ideal

Freedom

Altruism

Draw magical energy from

fear, sadness, hatred

happiness, love

It is these dichotomies and the author's relatively unbiased and non-judgmental portrayal of the two groups
which renders the whole effort so entertaining.

When we join the action, some time in the late 90s, both sides, behind the cover of petty skirmishes, is developing,
through intrigue and manipulation, a master blow that will overwhelmingly assert their dominance over the other side. Of
course, when one starts reading the first of the three novellas in The Day Watch, "Unauthorized Personnel
Permitted" -- at least without prior knowledge of the events in The Night Watch -- one isn't privy to what's
really going on, behind the scenes. A female Dark One, Alice, and a male Light One, Igor, are drained of all but a
fraction of their powers in a magic-driven street fight over an elderly woman who has been using magic without approval
or licence -- how very mundane, if not 'mundane.' Under the rules set up between the two sides so that their age-old
fight doesn't degenerate into a apocalyptic bloodbath, and overseen by an impartial but powerful organisation termed
the Inquisition, Alice (and Igor) must gradually rebuild their powers. Working in a mundane's summer camp she meets a
young man, they fall passionately in love, consummate their relationship, only to realise, when they have regained
sufficient strength to recognize it, that she is Dark, and he, Igor, is Light. He kills her and his inattention results
in a boy drowning. So far, ho-hum...not uninteresting, but where is all this going?

In "A Stranger Among Others" it becomes clear that the seemingly minor debacle over the old woman, actually had much
more far-flung consequences than one might have expected. It has created somewhat of a long-term power vacuum on the
Dark side, and both sides are scrambling to deal with or take advantage of it. Enter Vitaly Rogoza, a somewhat confused
middle-aged man with no past, no memory of who he is; a man who tends towards the Dark, but develops unnaturally quickly
and through unknown sources of power into a one-man rogue army, answering to neither side. Meanwhile, four
multiethnic Dark 'brothers' steal an ancient Dark artefact from the Inquisition and bring it to Moscow. The Light
are screaming 'foul' and eager to acquire the artefact, the Dark eager to hold on to it. A confluence of artefact,
top Dark and Light operatives, and Vitaly occurs at a Moscow airport, where a magic showdown occurs that will alter
the balance once again.

In the last story, "Another Power" a combination of intrigue, skullduggery and court-room drama, the Light Ones and
Dark Ones lick their wounds and take their many grievances to the court of the Inquisition -- while, of course,
continuing their scheming. This is where things really get interesting, where members on either side try to figure
out how a number of disparate events fit together, whether they are pawns or players in the game, why Alice was
seemingly sacrificed, who Vitaly was, and what master blows the two sides were planning. All this is developed in a
manner that only gives things away bit by bit.

The fact that Lukyanenko allows his story to unfold slowly, results in the reader not being immediately clued into
the greater picture, and necessitates the reader put the pieces of the puzzle together, to some degree along with
the characters, in a manner somewhat reminiscent of a mystery novel. This along with the intrigues, the intelligence
of the main characters, the almost corporate structure of the two sides, and the fact that all the characters are
adults, makes The Day Watch very much an adult-targeted dark fantasy. Rowling and Pullman's works
mentioned above, while entertaining for adults, are clearly targeted at younger readers. On the other hand, The
Day Watch, which might almost be termed a novel of contrasting ideologies (not say that pretentious,
scare-off-all-the-readers term, 'philosophical novel') -- if it didn't have elements of romance, action, fantasy
and even 'mundane' novels -- again is clearly targeted at adult readers.

So, if you're looking purely for an entertaining throw-away read, then The Night Watch may not satisfy you,
but certainly whether you tend to the dark or the light The Night Watch will provide an interesting look at
the age-old dichotomy.

Georges Dodds is a research scientist whose interests lie predominantly in both English and French pre-1950
imaginative fiction. Besides reviews and articles at SFSite and in fanzines such as
Argentus, Pulpdom
and WARP, he has published peer-reviewed articles in fields ranging from
folklore to water resource management. He is the creator and co-curator of
The Ape-Man, His Kith and Kin a website exploring thematic
precursors of Tarzan of the Apes, as well as works having possibly served as Edgar Rice Burroughs' documentary
sources. The close to 100 e-texts include a number of first time translations from the French by himself and
others. Georges is also the creator and curator of a website dedicated to
William Murray Graydon (1864-1946), a prolific
American-born author of boys' adventures. The website houses
biographical, and
bibliographical materials, as well as a score
of novels, and over 100
short stories.